


On Instinct

by Littleviolentone



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Anger, Confusion, Episode: s03e16 The Southern Raiders, Eventual Romance, F/M, Literal Sleeping Together, Reconciliation, Rescue, Sleep
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-24
Updated: 2020-08-29
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:20:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24350455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Littleviolentone/pseuds/Littleviolentone
Summary: "What are you doing? ""Keeping rocks from crushing you.""Okay. I'm not crushed, you can get off me now!""I'll take that as a thank you."The haze of adrenaline around her was almost a relief from the strange feeling of his voice vibrating down her spine as she crawled out from under his weight.
Relationships: Katara/Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 29
Kudos: 433





	1. The Attack

**Author's Note:**

> My take on "The Southern Raiders" and I am also trying my hand at a short multi-chapter fic, so wish me luck! 
> 
> Let me know what you think! 
> 
> Love,  
> Little Violent One

Katara knew that she wasn't being fair. 

Yes, Zuko had betrayed her under Ba Sing Se, and she was still very mad about it. But by now even she could see that the prince had no intention of betraying them again. And it was getting harder and harder to hang on to her own anger. 

Toph had forgiven him for burning her feet almost immediately. Sokka was practically singing his praises since Zuko had helped him rescue their dad and Suki. Aang had quickly fallen into the eager young pupil role and was very excited to try and impress his former nemesis.

The only one still holding on was Katara. She could say it was about the crystal catacombs, but that was only part of the truth. The other part was that she was angry at so many things and, like she'd said before, he made an easy target. 

She was mad that the invasion failed, mad that this damn war was no closer to ending, mad that Zuko betrayed her and then came back. She was mad that she'd grown up without a mother and that at almost 15, she was now essentially the matriarch of of a family full of children who never seemed to realize that she was still just a child herself.

But at night, when it was quiet and still and she couldn't escape her own thoughts, Katara would acknowledge that despite how readily he took her hatred, her first instinct was to trust him. She wanted so desperately to take him at his word, to be at ease with him the way she was with the others. But that required letting go of her anger and she couldn't do that yet.

That morning they were awoken, not by the singing of sparrokeets, but by Azula trying to bring the temple down around them. The group was on their feet in seconds as Aang closed the storm doors, that wouldn't hold for long.

Above her, Katara heard stone shifting, and looked up just in time to see the ceiling cave in. There was a shout of "LOOK OUT!" then she was knocked off her feet. 

Zuko held her tight to his body and rolled them mid-air to absorb the impact of landing. He rolled again to shield her body from falling debris. On instinct, Katara moved with him.

"What are you doing? "

"Keeping rocks from crushing you."

"Okay. I'm not crushed, you can get off me now!"

"I'll take that as a thank you."

The haze of adrenaline around her was almost a relief from the strange feeling of his voice vibrating down her spine as she crawled out from under his weight. 

She tried to ignore him as she moved to help the others get to safety, she really did, but some instinct she didn't have time to name made her aware that he wasn't moving with the rest of the group. He was walking towards the the danger, and she actively chose to ignore the urge to call him back to her side when he said he'd hold them off. 

Aang, however had no such issues, and called after his teacher with concern. Things were happening too fast. Toph and Haru had closed them more securely in and made an escape tunnel. She, Sokka, and Aang were trying to drag a panicked Appa inside. The the group was scared, and she couldn't see Zuko anymore. 

The decision was made to split up and she fought it even though she knew it was best. She hugged her father goodbye again and the group broke in half far too easily. 

Flying on Appa was normally a pleasant experience for Katara, but when he and Aang were working to dodge fire balls and bombs it got a lot harder to hang on.

With Aang on Appa's head, Toph holding Momo, and both Suki and Sokka holding on to Toph, Katara was the only one with free hands to be able to help. 

There were five airships in total, but it was hard to tell much else when the horizon kept twisting around them. One thing that was clear was Zuko as he employed his bending to jump the forty foot gap, La knows how many miles up in the air, between the airship he stood on and his sister's.Aang immediately maneuvered Appa around to get to him. 

Zuko and Azula fought like monsters, albeit different kinds. Azula threw blows with gleeful malice, while Zuko attacked with icy rage. But they were too evenly matched and an explosion of their bending sent them both flying into open air.

Katara kneeled up and stretched out her arms as Aang got them in position under Zuko's fall. He saw them and reached back, he would have pulled Katara straight out of the saddle if it hadn't been for Sokka's hand on her leg to steady her. And then, for the second time that morning, Zuko's overly warm body was pressing down on her.It only lasted a few seconds, but it felt so much longer.

"She's not gonna make it, " the prince said. His voice was confused as they all watched his sister fall to her death. But this was Azula, and she never went down easily. She twisted in mid-air, shot fire from her feet, and slid down the cliff face before coming to a stop, perfectly unharmed. "Of course she did."

Katara realized she was still holding tightly to Zuko's hand, and that he was returning her grip. It had been on instinct that she had reached for him, no one had asked her to. That same instinct told her to keep hanging on to him, to hold him tight and let him press her into the side of Appa's saddle while they flew the way Sokka was doing for Suki.

But she didn't trust her instincts with him, not anymore. So she dropped his hand and shifted as far away as their space and travel speed would allow. If she saw the look of shock and confusion, and something that might have been hurt, on his face then she pretended not to notice.


	2. The Fleet

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back! 
> 
> I was finally able to recover most of my old work after my computer crashed!
> 
> I'm so sorry this took so long, but hopefully you will like it.
> 
> Love,  
> Little Violent One

Zuko watched as Katara shut out Aang and her brother. Watched as she callously spat venom at her family with no regard to the hurt she caused. 

In his heart, he knew that the Avatar was right, his was the healthiest option. Uncle would have said the same thing. But what the boy didn't seem to quite understand was that Katara was in no way capable of forgiveness in that moment, no matter how much it hurt her to hold on to this rage.

Zuko had spent enough time amongst this group that he knew the rest of them simply would not understand her motivation for vengeance, not completely. He stayed quite unless it was to support her point and positioned himself at her back, his loyalty clear.

Eventually they were on their way. He was worried about her, Azula being cruel and cutting was normal, not so for Katara. He wanted to tell her that Sokka and Aang would easily forgive the words she'd said in anger, but she looked too brittle to be pushed. 

They broke into the tower and stole the fleets' position with almost laughable ease.

This was not the first military base Zuko had broken into, it wasn't even the first Fire Nation base he'd broken into, but he was amazed by how well he and Katara moved together. Silently, they slipped in and out with no one the wiser, the only harm done being a little spilled ink.

Had anyone seen them (an impossibility) they would have thought the two had been partners in crime for years. As it stood Zuko was simply grateful that he was no longer the focus of her rage.

He had suggested that she save her strength, she'd told him she had plenty. Now, standing there watching as she bent a man's body to her will, he believed her more than ever. 

The form she used was all strange spider-like movement, nothing at all like the smooth disciplined style she'd always used before. Zuko's eyes widened as he watched the captain, clearly in agony, forced to the ground before them.

"Think back," he said. "Think back to your last raid on the Southern Water Tribe."

"I don't know what you're talking about," the captain gritted painfully through his teeth. "Please, I don't know!"

"Don't lie!" He yelled. The Prince knelt down by the man's head and struggled to reign in his own rage. Katara's story was so similar to his own it was hard to separate his feelings on the matter, but he would have happily killed the man over the span of several days for her had she asked. But she hadn't, the only thing Katara had asked of him was to find her mother's murderer. "You look her in the eyes and tell me you don't remember what you did!"

In a grotesque rolling motion the man was on his feet again, he hung in the air as though suspended from invisible hooks. On his face was a clear picture of pain and terror. Blood running high, Zuko waited for the man to confess, but Katara's voice came instead. 

"It's not him," her voice was as small as he'd ever heard it. Zuko tried to argue, but she simply repeated herself with the same quiet, sad certainty and dropped her stance. The captain fell to the ground, no longer under Katara's control. 

Not willing to let this effort be in vain, Zuko hauled the man back to his feet and pinned him to the wall. He was aware that nothing he could do to the man would be anywhere near as scary as what Katara had just done, but that didn't mean he couldn't be plenty scary on his own. Two minutes of questioning and he had a location and the name Yon Rah.

When they were safe on Appa's back and headed in the right direction, Zuko laid down in the saddle and pretended he couldn't hear her quite sobs. He feigned sleep and tried to convince himself that he didn't want to hold her as she cried, to show her she wasn't alone, to tell her she didn't always have to be so strong. 

He could protect her from firebenders and falling rocks, as he had the day before, but taking her in his arms wouldn't shelter her from the pain she was in now. Even if it would, he doubted she would let him.

In the end it didn't matter if she would let Zuko hold her or not. It didn't even matter if she forgave him or not, though he had done everything he could to atone, and desperately hoped for both in the seclusion of his thoughts. The only thing that mattered here was Katara's own closure.

With that goal firmly in place, the Prince would let nothing stop him. Zuko would take her there and let her do as she pleased to the man who had caused her so many nightmares, the rest he would figure out later.


	3. The Monster

Zuko remembered the first time he had seen a hurricane up close. It hadn't even been a full year since his banishment, his eye only just gaining back a little sight.

There was a moment as he and his crew ran about the ship, fighting for their lives against nature itself, that his fear was overtaken by awe.

The wind and rain and waves before him had been terrible, yes, but they were also undeniably, breathtakingly beautiful. 

They found Yon Rah in his quaint little village, his own mother alive and well. His home safe and unguarded, his fears small and easily dealt with. And beside the prince, Katara writhed in anger. 

She had gone silent and still, only moving to keep her prey in sight. 

Zuko recognized her for the predator she was in that moment and took charge of the plan. Katara needed an outlet for her rage, and the prince feared that his other, more innocent subjects, might become collateral damage if he wasn't careful. 

They stalked him down the road away from the village. Zuko had been concerned that Katara's heavier footsteps would give them away, and he was partially right. Yon Rah began to suspect a tail, but the old monster was out of practice.

Soon he was scared enough to yell threats and shoot fire at a bush he suspected of hiding his pursuers.

Zuko moved on silent feet and had the man knocked back on his ass before he had even finished turning around. 

"We weren't behind the bush."

He kept his eyes on the monster and held his stance as Katara approach slowly from behind. 

"Do you know who I am? " she asked, voice deadly and soft.

The monster said no, Katara's outward calm was rapidly deteriorating. 

"Oh, you had better remember me like your life depends on it!"

Slowly the monster did remember her, "the little Watertribe girl," and he filled in the rest of the story. 

Zuko was sick as he listened to to the tale. He had done horrible things for his nation, but he had never been needlessly cruel for the sake of it. Never toyed with someone's life just for power or entertainment. And he had only ever killed as a last resort. In this man's eyes he saw his father's malice and he shuddered. 

Katara became a study in contradictions. Her face and voice exuding uncontrollable rage, while her bending was the very definition of deadly control. 

Zuko watched in awe as Katara formed a second sky above them. As she brought it crashing down and turned it into a wave of shrapnel. As she stopped at the last possible second and the whole world seemed to collectively hold its breath. 

She was terrible. She was beautiful. She dropped her stance, and Zuko stood in wonder at the strength of her.

The monster cried and begged for mercy, but she turned and walked away. Zuko followed in confusion. 

She didn't make it very far, just over the next hill, before collapsing to the ground with a scream. The Prince moved on instinct, gathering her to his chest.

She screamed and raged and beat the ground and Zuko held her tight through it all. After minutes or hours of weathering her heartbreak he heard her speak with a rough voice. 

"I can't do it. I can't do it! He needs to die, he deserves to die! But I can't do it!"

His heart broke, his resolve hardened, and he caught her chin gently against his knuckle so she looked him in the eye.

"I can."

"What?" she asked, stunned and confused. 

"I can kill him," the Prince explained. "If that's what you need, I will kill him right now."

"No, Zuko I couldn't ask you-"

"You didn't ask," he interrupted. "I offered. No judgment, no questions asked, if this is what you need then I'll do it."

She was staring at him as though she'd never seen him before. Like he was something new and wonderful, but she took a long time to answer. 

"Don't kill him," she said darkly. And Zuko understood her perfectly. 

He gave her one final squeeze before standing and turning to find Yon Rah. 

It was fully night when he sat down by her side again, leaning against Appa's fluffy side in the firelight. 

If she had asked he would have told her how he had so carefully broken every joint in the monster's legs so he would never walk again. He would have told her about his cries of pain, and how his forehead was now branded with the word murderer. But she didn't ask. 

She simply turned to him and began wordlessly healing him of all the fractures and contusions he had acquired in her service. It was only when his hands were as good as new that she spoke at all.

"Is he alive?"

"Only just," he reported. 

"Good." There was more she wanted to say, he could see it. She would have said thank you, or maybe apologized for asking him to do it, but she didn't. She couldn't. It was all still far too fresh. 

Zuko understood that and wordlessly raised his arm to hold her once more. She surprised him when, instead of curling into his side, she crawled between his spread legs and draped herself across his chest. 

He held her tight, running is fingers through her hair, as she cried herself to sleep. Exhausted, he was quick to follow suit.

They would have to get back to the other's soon. Zuko had given Aang directions to his house on Ember Island. They would have to go back to normal, whatever that meant for them now.

But not just yet. For right now it was enough that they could sleep safely in each other's arms and be at peace, if only for a little while.


	4. The Manor

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we are the final chapter. I had fun with it, and I really hope you guys did too.
> 
> Love,  
> Little Violent One

Katara made several apologies to Aang and Sokka when she saw them again. Both for her harsh words and for causing them so much worry. She made apologies to Suki and Toph as well, for leaving them with no warning. 

She was easily forgiven, as Zuko had known she would be, and things settled back into routine. The only outward change being the new friendship between Katara and Zuko. 

Katara and Suki, being the only two that knew how, took turns cooking. Aang trained with Zuko every morning and would switch off training with either Toph or Katara in the afternoons. Sokka drew up battle plans with Suki, and it all became oddly comfortable. 

But another routine had taken hold as well. Every night, when she was sure every one else was fast asleep, Katara crept from her room and slunk down the hall to climb into bed with Zuko.

He was always awake and waiting for her, and he never turned her away. Every night, without fail, he would hold out the covers for her before wrapping his overly warm body around her and sighing "good night, " into her hair.

That first night at the Firelord's beachside manor Katara had tossed and turned restlessly for hours before getting up to find him.

He'd shot up in bed, startled by her sudden entry, and called her name in confusion and worry. Katara could only stare at the man who now looked so very boyish with his hair all fluffed from his pillow. How had she ever been afraid of him?

"Katara," he called again. "Is every thing alright, are you okay? " His voice had been low and made even rougher than normal by sleep.

Katara stood in his doorway and thought of how he'd come to her that night after dealing with Yon Rah. How his hands had been covered in blood. How she had healed so many little fractures in his hands and arms, and one in his ribs. She suspected the fractured rib was from knocking her out of the way of the falling ceiling, that he'd just been silently enduring for days, for her.

"No," she finally managed to whisper. "I'm not okay."

Slowly he stood from the bed and made his way to her. When he was close enough to touch her he stopped and Katara found herself wishing him closer so that she could feel the intense warmth radiating from his skin. 

"The Monster," she tapped her head in illustration. "He's still there and I can't get him out."

The Prince nodded in understanding and reached up with both hands to gently cradle her skull. She melted into his touch and latched her cooler hands onto his forearms to keep him in place. 

"Monsters are easier to fight when you're not alone," he rasped into her hair. Katara nodded, accepting the veiled offer of companionship quickly. 

He ghosted a kiss across her forehead before leading her by the hand back to his bed. It was only when they were both under the blankets and Katara had molded herself to his chest once again, that she registered the fact that the Prince was entirely shirtless. 

Instead of being embarrassed, she had instead found it soothing. He was running his fingers through her hair like he had the night before, and Katara reached out with her bending, like putting a finger to his pulse, just to feel how alive he was next to her.

Just before she drifted off she heard him whisper; "we'll keep each other's monsters away."

And every night they had been at the manor, they had. They had slept in each other's arms in peace for weeks with no one the wiser. 

The night before the comet, no one was easy. Katara was pacing the length of her room when Zuko broke pattern and came to her.

She took one look at his wild-eyed face and mussed up hair, and pulled him into a tight hug on the spot. Zuko buried his face in her shoulder and squeezed her waist so tightly that her feet almost came off the floor. 

"That's my father," he mumbled into her skin.

"What?"

"That's my father we're going to fight. My father and my sister. And I know what he's done, better than anyone. I know that they're monsters, that he is a monster. I know what needs to happen.... but he-he's still my father." The Prince was gasping now, and fighting back tears.

"And Aang! Aang's just a child, he's twelve years old! I just told a child that he had no choice but to kill my father! And Azula needs to be stopped too, she'll be there, I know she will! She's just as bad, but thinking about what we're about to do, and about what she has planned, all I can see... is that little girl whose hair I helped to tie back every morning! That's my family, Katara! That's my family, and I just ordered their deaths! "

He was sobbing now. Shaking in her arms as tears streamed down his face. Katara could only stroke his hair through her own falling tears as he broke apart against her. She had no words to soothe him, no hope to offer, just her steady presence as he trembled in her hold.

At some point they both crumpled to the floor, but neither of them really noticed until hours later when his tears finally shuddered to a stop.

"Come on, " she spoke gently. "Let's go to bed." She reached out slowly and untied the sash that held his tunic in place, slipping the garment from his broad shoulders. 

She had truly only intended to help him get ready for bed, but it now felt as though gravity had shifted around them. Zuko held her eyes, watching to be sure she wanted this, as his warm wide hands untied her top.

Katara was unable to form words as they both knelt across from each other, naked from the waist up. She was suddenly desperate to feel something good. To take Zuko's mind off this hell the future held for him. To forget, just for a little while, how many people she loved might die within the next few days. 

Zuko was waiting for her to make the next move, so she did the only thing she could think of; she kissed him like they might both be dead tomorrow. 

Things happened fairly quickly after that. Their natural compatibility and grace when fighting together translated itself seamlessly into this new dance. They were effortless together. 

Clothing was shed with the efficiency the hundredth coupling, not the first. Rolling on the floor, they exchanged kisses and nips and moans like they had all the time in the world. 

After, as the two laid in a boneless heap on the floorboards, it was Zuko who found the strength to move first. He pulled them, both naked, up onto her mattress and tossed the blanket over their cooling bodies.

On instinct Katara pressed herself into the Prince's chest, ducking her head under his chin. He held her tightly, savoring the feeling of her soft skin against his. Just before she fell asleep Katara heard him whisper into her hair. 

"I love you, Katara. "


End file.
